Canada Finds Glyphosate in Grains, U.S. Chooses Not to Look

April 25th, 2017

Cornucopia’s Take: Given glyphosate’s suspected effect on human health at even very small levels, Canada’s finding of glyphosate in 30% of their samples is alarming. The U.S. had previously planned to test for glyphosate, but has recently abandoned the intended effort.

In testing an array of foods and beverages for the weedkiller glyphosate, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency found excessive residue levels in 3.9 percent of the grain products sampled, says The Western Producer. The agency ran tests on 3,188 food samples, and while it detected traces of glyphosate in nearly 30 percent of them, only 1.3 percent of the samples overall exceeded the government limits.

The CFIA told the newspaper that it would not identify the types and names of the grain products that exceeded the residue levels. “The report will not include raw data, company or brand names,” said the CFIA in an email. “Information about individual companies and products are not included in the reports because the relationships between distributors and manufacturers of specific products may be confidential business information.”

Glyphosate is the world’s most widely used herbicide and best known under the brand name Roundup. Use of the weedkiller soared after Monsanto genetically engineered corn, soybeans, cotton, sugar beets and other crops to tolerate doses of the chemical. The WHO cancer agency concluded in March 2015 that glyphosate was probably carcinogenic to humans. Monsanto has disputed the finding and various other scientific bodies say it is safe.

Canada began testing for glyphosate in food in 2015 to gain an understanding of its prevalence. A CFIA employee gave a copy of results to the advocacy group U.S. Right to Know. The CFIA confirmed to The Western Producer that the information was accurate.

USDA has canceled plans to test for glyphosate residue in corn syrup, according to documents acquired under the Freedom of Information Act by journalist Carey Gillam. Her description of the CFIA report is available here.

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